what do i think of when i sit down and have a moment to myself?

sometimes i think about the movie brewing in my head. I have been thinking of it for a long time in fact. i think that as soon as i can get some time i really should have to get a hold of my actors and actresses, and get everything together.

i think of the couple having the picnic in the rain, soaking wet and not speaking to each other.

i think of the man in the suit, walking into the water determinedly.

i think of the glass, rolling off the table spilling the wine generously before it smashes.

i think of the couple sleeping the lazy afternoon away, snuggled up close on the couch or on the grass. He says, i love you catherine. She says drowsily, mmm... i love you ben. But his name is not ben.


i think, this is pure.

who am i to you on this country road? 

have you ever felt lost? 

.... 

goodnight, thank you all for coming

this is going to be one of those rare posts said in my own voice, in a dear-diary fashion. but let's not get too much into that.

the top 5 caper and heist movies of the last ten years do not, i repeat, do not include Ocean's Twelve, or Eleven, even though they may have their moments. the number one heist movie is probably Heist by David Mamet, and if i get out of control, the top three spots would be occupied by him. Ok i'm out of control. The Spanish Prisoner and Spartan occupy the next two slots jointly. Ronin was pretty good, and rather a caper movie as opposed to a spy movie. I liked Matchstick Men too, though i don't think it belongs in the Top 5 of the past ten. I'll have to further consider the last spot.


So the Boom Boom Room closed its doors at long last. It was a tearful farewell for something so intent on a good time for the past twelve years. The patronne and patronna came up onstage and said lots of good-byes and told us a little about what goes on behind the scenes in running the most risque mainstream club in spore. Everybody cried, with the knowledge that a light had gone out in the Singapore landscape. Never mind what kind of light, it was a light - i know that the show was all lip-synching and hammy/draggy posturing, except sometimes with the stand-up routine. i know that besides dancing, not a lot of heavyweight talent was showcased, and that the place was exhibitionist rather than experimental; but it was a celebration of the Other, an in-your-face attempt to make your unknown neighbours real to you. Throughout the night, they said this line, "our blood is also red". We all want to be part of a community, to be accepted, on some level, no matter how radical we are. I suppose the Boom Boom Room was an institution - no, i don't suppose, i know it was an institution for the people that lived and worked by it. No individual club on Mohamad Sultan Road is an institution with it's top 40/retro commercialism.

and so all that listening to the patron, patronna and the doyenne of Boom Boom made my mind of course shift to the idea for the Temasek Dance Hall, and i spent a long time in the dark club mulling over the fate of this fictional place, which will also be, i hope, an institution in it's own world. Patronne, i would speak with you about what it would be to be a facilitator.

oh the fleetingness of this world. palpable in an institution that disappears. if it were to reopen tomorrow, there would still be no similarity to the previous. what's past is past and can never be again. you could feel it in the room, the transcience of time: they didn't know if or when they would all meet again. actually, neither do we - but we never realise it.



curtain closes, exeunt with fanfare.

can you let go of the past? 

the first of the stills from the movie 

can you let go of the past? 

excerpt (ii)

4. In a field two trees stand. Birds nest in them, rabbits burrow deep between their roots and on hot days small animals rest in the shade of their outstretched leafy branches. During idle afternoons and starlit nights lovers nestle between them, lulled by the singing of the branches, and talk of dreams and make promises whispered in ears, and leave hearts and arrows and names carved onto the bark in declaration. One stormy day the sky turns black as night, and the wind and rain lash as if the sea had come ashore. Lightning cleaves one of the trees in two, charring the branches and gashing the trunk in a curved line. The next day reveals the blackened, smoky remnants of the barren form of the tree, burned inside and out, branches now twigs emptily reaching for the sky. The other tree is now twice as full, with all the creatures that survived sheltering within its wide arms and roots now. On the next idle afternoon a pair of lovers come wandering by, marvelling at the tragedy of the singed tree. After their lovemaking they declare their love, and the boy takes out his pocketknife, unfolds it and decides to put her name first, and a heart and arrow between their names. As he moves to carve the tree reaches down, grabs him and chokes the consciousness out of him. He wakes up later, ten feet from the nearest branch, alone because she has taken the car, and runs home. No one comes there anymore after a while.

excerpt

A woman knocks into a man on the street.

“Sorry,” she says, then, “Wait, do I know you?”

“I don’t think so,” says the man, gathering his things from the floor.

“Yes, I think I do know you –“ He is already walking away. “Wait sorry about knocking your things over –“

He turns, grunts, turns away.

“Wait I do know you!” she cries. Recognition dawns. “You fucked my sister, and you tried to fuck me when she wasn’t around.”

He has turned, and is walking away.

“Come back here!” she yells. “You tried to fuck my sister.” He is descending the steps, going into the train station. She grabs his shoulder but he shrugs her off. She appeals to the people in the station. “He fucked my sister, and then tried to fuck me! We only got rid of him when my sister tried to kill him and kicked him out of the house!”

“Good thing too,” came a sympathetic reply from a passer by, appraising the man’s receding form.

“Best put it behind you,” said another.

“Help me, hey, stop you bastard,” she says, still following him onto the platform. Almost everybody ignores her, as they walk on, walk along, walk away.

“You fucked my sister and tried to do me too,” she says quietly, as he squeezes onto the train. They face each other.

“This isn’t your train,” he says. “You’re late for work.”

“I know.”

“Stop this.”

“I won’t.”

The doors close. They are separated by the glass.

“You can’t hide forever, father.”

down down down

fallen, i have sunk so low. i am the severance, the sibilance, where is my deliverance? i see you here, i see myself here. but this is not any where, this is not any thing.

a dead computer, an angel in a field, no editing software, crazy late nights. this is what pure will be made of.

that, and a lot of last year's agony.

how pure

how pure is it? it is as pure as it can be, given the winding snow, driving heat, blistering frustration and unrest here.


welcome, all.